Just ask the silver fox anchorman what it was like shooting Planet in Peril, the new four-hour environmental-issues series he did with Animal Planet host Jeff Corwin. The two, along with CNN’s chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta, crossed four continents and 13 countries for the series, which debuts on CNN Tues., Oct. 23.

“What I really learned is you actually have to go into nature to report on the environment, which is sort of annoying because I really don’t like nature very much,” Cooper said last night at a Netflix-hosted preview of the series at Grauman’s Chinese Theater in Hollywood. “And to be with Jeff Corwin, who really does seem to enjoy it, was a little disconcerting.”

The 40-year-old anchor tried to share Corwin’s enthusiasm. “He would literally go off at 2 a.m. in the middle of the Brazillian rainforest with nothing more than a flashlight on his head, and I would trudge after him with a little video camera and also a much weaker flashlight,” Anderson said. “But after about three nights, I realized that was my idea of hell, because there are things you have never seen before flying around and hitting me in the face. Jeff would be like, ‘Oh my god, look, it’s the pygmy tree frog!’ and, literally, the frog would jump onto his face. That is my idea of hell…I did about three nights of it, but then I was like, ‘No more!’”

Corwin cracked, “Anderson was acting like the first person who gets killed in a horror movie.”

When CNN producer David Doss announced that Planet in Peril would probably become a regular feature on Anderson Cooper 360º, Cooper groaned, “Jesus Christ! We really need to solve this whole environmental thing quickly, because I really don’t want to do it again.”

you know, watching those clips — Gupta is the only one who makes any sense. Cooper and Corwin are just doing beauty shots the entire time, whereas Gupta actually reports the story. Cooper has jumped the shark, in my opinion.